New Play in Manhattan

Look After Lulu (adapted by Noel Coward from Georges Feydeau's Occupe toi d'Amélie) is a game of musical chairs played with beds. Philippe (George Baker), who must leave Paris on regimental maneuvers, asks his pal Marcel (Roddy McDowall) to look after his mistress Lulu ("Take her to the zoo"). But before Lulu (Tammy Grimes) can say "zoo, la la," she wakes up in bed with her chaperon. She promptly dives under it to make room for Marcel's own mistress, a mock-seductive duchess (Polly Rowles) with the voice and manner of Poe's Raven. From across the frozen tundra comes the Prince of Salestria, who wants to thaw out with Lulu in the same busy bed. Since Lulu is a cocotte, pleasure is business, but business is also her pleasure. For a 10% share of the loot, she agrees to fake marriage to Marcel to gull Marcel's godfather out of a fortune. When Philippe returns unexpectedly, the plot double-quickens.

Nod Coward's dialogue for this turn-of-the-century French farce is broad more often than bright, and Cyril Ritchard's direction is often as agitated as it is agile. The cast works hard for its laughs, but it does get them. Tammy Grimes chirps and wiggles saucily, although she suggests a visiting British cutup rather than a Parisian cocotte. Cecil Beaton's settings are like a brilliant tropical aquarium with a lavish flora of swirling, colorful gowns and hats.

Director Ritchard's situation and sight gags in Lulu are best. In one lively scene, Lulu routs the duchess by prancing into Marcel's bedroom flailing a pair of fireworks sparklers; in another, an impassioned lover avidly kisses Lulu's clothed arm to the elbow, then fastidiously spits out the green fuzz.